Review: Iron Man 2 (2010)
May 9th 2010 04:53
Iron Man 2 (Favreau, 2010)
Written May 8, 2010
Spoilers: contains a few spoilers
When you’ve set the bar incredibly high, anything that comes after is always a challenge. The first Iron Man subverted the super-hero film genre by revealing Tony Stark to be titular character and thus, allowing the film franchise to avoid the pitfalls of character deception and overall cover-up, thus creating a far more interesting concept for subsequent films. Iron Man 2 picks up directly after Stark’s announcement and then jumps six months into the future as we watch Ivan Vanko (otherwise known as Whiplash) create his own weapon of mass destruction to take down Stark and revenge his father at the same time. Vanko is not given much screen time with Stark and therefore, never fully becomes a nemesis. Instead, he is just someone with an agenda. The film fails to provide the audience with enough interaction between Iron Man and Vanko. Stark does learn why Vanko hates him but he doesn’t seem to care much and a dynamic between the two of them never develops.
The better villain in the film (of the corporate nature) is Justin Hammer, played by the brilliant Sam Rockwell. Hammer is the Luther to Stark’s Superman. The interactions between Hammer and Stark sparkle from the get-go when, at a senate weapon’s hearing, Stark visibly grinds and his teeth and immediately shuts up at being called ‘Anthony’ by the obnoxious Hammer. Cut to a later scene in Monaco, when Stark and Hammer exchange quick, witty banter akin to Stewart and Grant in The Philadelphia Story. Downey Jr. and Rockwell are fantastic in these scenes and throughout.
In fact, the film's strongest sequences are its dialogue, rather than its action. Penned by actor and writer of Tropic Thunder Justin Theroux, the script is filled with overlapping Screwball Comedy like dialogue, particularly between Stark and Pepper Pots who are such a refreshing inclusion to the whole ‘super-hero gets the girl’ subplot. These scenes are highly enjoyable. In terms of the action, the best sequence is the race track scene. This scene was also heightened by the need to get Stark ‘the case’ and Stark’s right-hand man Happy (Favreau) being rather bad-ass behind the wheel of a car.
An action sequence that fails in this reviewer’s eyes is a later one with Stark and Rhodey (now played by Don Cheadle, who is far more engaging in the role than Terrence Howard). This has less to do with the action within and more with the entire birth of War Machine. The catalyst which brings about War Machine and the subsequent events felt clumsy, rushed, and uneven. This film is certainly trying to pack in many, many elements into such a short run-time for a film of this scale (2 hours and 4 minutes) but still, Stark getting drunk at a party shouldn’t necessarily have led to Rhodey putting on the suit and then stealing it for the United States Air Force. Another thing which was supposed to be addressed more in this film and was slightly addressed in the first is Stark’s drinking problem, which has never really gone away. Perhaps if it had been played up more, Rhodey’s actions would have been more believable. This same scene also contained a rather long cameo by the late DJ AM (Adam Goldstein), who is even addressed by name and has some spoken dialogue. His presence was wistful and this reviewer’s audience let out a simultaneous ‘awww’ at the sight of him; the credits include an ‘in memory of’ for Goldstein.
The film’s other large storyline is the continued tie-in with S.H.I.E.L.D. and thus we are greeted with Nick Fury’s (Samuel L. Jackson) presence along with Natalie Rushman (Scarlett Johansson), who comic book fans will know is really Black Widow. Johansson works will within the story, however her main action sequence highly stylized and the camera-work was sped-up to a ridiculous degree. This sequence was far too self-aware of itself as was Samuel L. Jackson’s entire performance. It’s rather sad the caricature that Jackson has become. He may have an eye patch, but he isn’t Nick Fury. Instead, he’s the same man that graces every single MTV Movie Awards and the same character from Snakes on a Plane; hence, himself. Ultimately, this takes away from the importance of Fury’s presence which is setting up the rest of the Marvel films along with The Avengers movie; hints of these events are mentioned numerous times, like Fury saying ‘I got problems in the Southwest!’ and the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent needing to head off to New Mexico (note: anyone who stayed after till after the credits was greeted to an ultra-geeky surprise).
Iron Man 2 is no-doubt entertaining and does include some wonderful scenes. There are certainly those head-scratching moments though, such as when Black Widow dismantles a certain something late in the film; why couldn’t she do that with everything? But, no, that would have been rather anti-climatic. Also, Vanko had no idea that Stark would be in that car, so what exactly was his main goal? Was he just planning to head onto the track to draw out Iron Man? There are certainly logic issues to nitpick away at.
Nevertheless, Iron Man 2 excels at witty dialogue, Robert Downey Jr. continuing to be the coolest super-hero there is, Sam Rockwell (‘nuff said), the relationship between Stark and Pepper, and the casting of Mad Men’s awesome John Slattery as Howard Starke in archival footage. Downey Jr. alone will probably keep this reviewer around for The Avengers film, even though recent Captain America casting news is not promising.
To conclude, Iron Man 2 is not the near perfect film its predecessor was; it is however, a highly entertaining film with some great performances.
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